Murphy's law

Murphy's law is a popular adage that states that "things will go wrong in any given situation, if you give them a chance," or more commonly, "whatever can go wrong, will go wrong." A number of variants on the rule have been formulated, as have several corollaries.

If there's more than one way to do a job, and one of those ways will result in disaster, then somebody will do it that way

According to Robert Murphy (son of Edward A. Murphy, Jr.) his father's statement was along these lines; reported in People (January 31, 1983), p. 82. Alternately reported as "If there is a wrong way to do something, then someone will do it", in Robert L. Forward, "Murphy Lives!", Science 83 (January-February 1983), p. 78. Also commonly reported as, "If anything can go wrong, it will", in J. A. Simpson, ed., The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Proverbs (1982), p. 4.